Tempering the Cosmic Scope Problem in Christian Soteriology: Hylemorphic Animalism and Gregory of Nazianzus Jonathan Curtis Rutledge [forthcoming in Religious Studies] Christianity consists of a deposit of faith which includes an articulation of certain beliefs that its adherents affirm. 1 Among these beliefs stands the claim that the Incarnation and Atonement reconciled humanity to God; that is, the deposit of faith tells us that the scope of the work of Christ includes humanity. 2 But the scope of redemption does not stop at humanity, for the Christian scriptures claim that, 19 [In Christ] all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. 3 What we find in this passage is the claim that the scope of redemption is radically inclusive. Indeed, it is so inclusive as to exclude no type of created thing whatsoever (i.e. as indicated by the ‘all things, whether on earth or in heaven’ 4 ). In other words, this passage teaches that Christ’s redemptive work has cosmic scope. 5 So, belief that Christ’s redemptive work extends to humanity and the rest of the cosmos belongs to the deposit of faith. This much is not especially controversial. But when it comes to the mechanics of such redemption or attempts to explain how the benefits of Christ’s redemptive work might extend to the cosmos, little reflection has been carried out. It is the purpose of this essay to fill 1 I am not assuming any sort of view on the nature of saving faith and whether or not it has any particular cognitive commitments (e.g. that God exists, that the Kingdom of God is here, etc.). For one recent attempt to argue against the inclusion of cognitive commitments in Christianity, see (Kvanvig 2018, chapter 4). For questions of doctrines of assurance closely related to these issues, see (Rutledge 2017). 2 It’s not important for the purposes of this paper to discuss debates about Unlimited vs. Limited (or singular/particular) Atonement. For questions concerning that, see (Crisp 2014). 3 Colossians 1:19-20 (ESV). All biblical citations, unless noted otherwise, will be in this translation. (Bonting 2003, 599) cites 2 Corinthians 5:19 in this regard, but the referent of ‘the world’ (kosmon) is not the actual cosmos. The referent is all humankind, so this verse is inapt to make the point. 4 There is a type-token ambiguity here. The verse could mean either all token things on heaven and earth are reconciled to God (including every individual human or every individual atom) or all kinds of things on heaven and earth are reconciled to God (though possibly some tokens of each type are in fact not reconciled to God). I take it that context and Christian tradition both suggest the latter interpretation is the proper one; and thus, there is no quick argument to universalism from this verse alone. 5 One referee helpfully suggested that the sorts of things that are reconciled together are persons, and neither of the referents of ‘humanity’ or ‘humankind’ count as persons. I have two reflections to offer in this regard. First, claiming that humanity could not count as a person is at least controversial. See (List and Pettit 2011), (Tollefsen 2015), and (Cockayne forthcoming) for reasons to think otherwise. Second, I do not wish to commit to a particular ontology of groups, so I offer the following as a reductionist-friendly translation of the claim that “humankind/humanity was reconciled to God”: there was some obstacle to union with God (e.g. a metaphysically congenital condition partly constituting original sin) that attached to any individual human. Moreover, the Assumption healed that condition for any individual human who subsequently opted to participate in the New Covenant following Jesus’ sacrifice.
Jonathan Curtis Rutledge [forthcoming in Religious Studies]
Christianity consists of a deposit of faith which includes an
articulation of certain beliefs that its adherents affirm.1 Among
these beliefs stands the claim that the Incarnation and Atonement
reconciled humanity to God; that is, the deposit of faith tells us
that the scope of the work of Christ includes humanity.2
But the scope of redemption does not stop at humanity, for the
Christian scriptures claim that,
19 [In Christ] all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and
through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or
in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.3
What we find in this passage is the claim that the scope of
redemption is radically inclusive. Indeed, it is so inclusive as to
exclude no type of created thing whatsoever (i.e. as indicated by
the ‘all things, whether on earth or in heaven’4). In other words,
this passage teaches that Christ’s redemptive work has cosmic
scope.5
So, belief that Christ’s redemptive work extends to humanity and
the rest of the cosmos belongs to the deposit of faith. This much
is not especially controversial. But when it comes to the mechanics
of such redemption or attempts to explain how the benefits of
Christ’s redemptive work might extend to the cosmos, little
reflection has been carried out. It is the purpose of this essay to
fill 1 I am not assuming any sort of view on the nature of saving
faith and whether or not it has any particular cognitive
commitments (e.g. that God exists, that the Kingdom of God is here,
etc.). For one recent attempt to argue against the inclusion of
cognitive commitments in Christianity, see (Kvanvig 2018, chapter
4). For questions of doctrines of assurance closely related to
these issues, see (Rutledge 2017). 2 It’s not important for the
purposes of this paper to discuss debates about Unlimited vs.
Limited (or singular/particular) Atonement. For questions
concerning that, see (Crisp 2014). 3 Colossians 1:19-20 (ESV). All
biblical citations, unless noted otherwise, will be in this
translation. (Bonting 2003, 599) cites 2 Corinthians 5:19 in this
regard, but the referent of ‘the world’ (kosmon) is not the actual
cosmos. The referent is all humankind, so this verse is inapt to
make the point. 4 There is a type-token ambiguity here. The verse
could mean either all token things on heaven and earth are
reconciled to God (including every individual human or every
individual atom) or all kinds of things on heaven and earth are
reconciled to God (though possibly some tokens of each type are in
fact not reconciled to God). I take it that context and Christian
tradition both suggest the latter interpretation is the proper one;
and thus, there is no quick argument to universalism from this
verse alone. 5 One referee helpfully suggested that the sorts of
things that are reconciled together are persons, and neither of the
referents of ‘humanity’ or ‘humankind’ count as persons. I have two
reflections to offer in this regard. First, claiming that humanity
could not count as a person is at least controversial. See (List
and Pettit 2011), (Tollefsen 2015), and (Cockayne forthcoming) for
reasons to think otherwise. Second, I do not wish to commit to a
particular ontology of groups, so I offer the following as a
reductionist-friendly translation of the claim that
“humankind/humanity was reconciled to God”: there was some obstacle
to union with God (e.g. a metaphysically congenital condition
partly constituting original sin) that attached to any individual
human. Moreover, the Assumption healed that condition for any
individual human who subsequently opted to participate in the New
Covenant following Jesus’ sacrifice.
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that lacuna by offering a partial explanation for how Christ’s
redemptive benefits might be rightly said to have cosmic
scope.
To adequately address this cosmic scope problem, however, it will
not suffice to consider only the general question of how Christ’s
work might extend to all creation in the same way. It is, of
course, worth considering whether or not this could be the case,
but it seems that there is one particular possibility that creates
special difficulties for such an approach.
This particular possibility is the potential for the discovery of
extra-terrestrial intelligences (henceforth, ‘ETIs’) who bear a
certain similarity to humanity with respect to (i) cognitive
ability and (ii) the possession of a species-specific history which
includes at least one immoral action resulting in a Fall.6 The
reason this particular case is more difficult is that Christ’s
assumption of a human nature is motivated by the fact that
humankind, in Adam7, committed a primal sin resulting in a
corrupted nature the healing of which could be achieved only by its
divine assumption.8 Thus, if we were to learn of the existence of
ETIs as described here, we should consider whether their nature
similarly admits of some form of corruption that could only be
healed (i.e. only redeemed) by a divine assumption of their alien
nature. If so, then the discovery of such alien life would seem to
entail (given certain plausible assumptions) that the Godhead
assumed (or would assume) more than one non-divine nature. That is,
given such a discovery, it appears that Christians would need to
posit the actuality of multiple incarnations. I ultimately argue,
however that this apparent need for multiple incarnations is
nothing more than apparent.9
In this paper, I offer an account of human nature (i.e. a view
which has come to be known as hylemorphic animalism) which tempers
the difficulties of explaining how Christ’s work can have cosmic
scope in the two ways briefly delineated above. I say that my
account ‘tempers the difficulties’ because I do not claim that it
solves all of those difficulties. Nonetheless, my proposed solution
makes the cosmic scope problem of Christian soteriology less
worrisome in important respects, and so, deserves consideration
among other attempts to address similar issues.10
6 The special case of humanity’s redemption is made theologically
intelligible by the posit of a fall. For a trenchant discussion of
significant theological developments in the history of doctrines of
original sin and the Fall, see (McFarland 2010). 7 There is no
commitment to a historically literalistic reading of Genesis here.
Indeed, we can take the more permissive view of reading Adam as
archetypal of all humankind if we so choose without inconsistency
of the positions defended in this paper. 8 This claim does not
depend on a denial of the Incarnation Anyway school of thought.
Incarnation Anyway advocates can allow that incarnation is
overdetermined because the number of sufficient reasons for God to
become incarnate is greater than one. The above account could be
made into an Incarnation Anyway position by simply adding the
thesis that healing the effects of the primal sin is only one of
the multiple sufficient reasons for incarnation. 9 (Peters 2018)
offers four approaches to the question of the salvation of ETIs
involving combinations of either fix-a- broken-creation or
incarnation-anyway models of the divine motivations for
incarnation, along with either positing a single or multiple
incarnation approach. The only logically incompatible theses
involved here, however, are the single or multiple incarnation
models. The fix-a-broken-creation and incarnation-anyway approaches
are co-instantiable. 10 As one referee has helpfully suggested,
someone could plausibly offer a metaphysical idealism in the
tradition of Bishop Berkeley that would overcome the theological
objection I advance against substance dualism’s ability to overcome
the
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Allow me, then, to briefly outline the structure of what follows. I
begin in §1 with an attempt by Sjoerd L. Bonting to address the
general question of how Christ’s work might cover all of creation
in one fell swoop.11 On my reading of Bonting, his solution only
works by assuming a principle of Christology due to Gregory of
Nazianzus; namely, that that which is not assumed is not redeemed.
Although I accept Gregory’s Principle (henceforth, ‘GP’), I do not
accept the interpretation of it required for the validity of
Bonting’s argument. In place of Bonting’s solution to the general
question of the cosmic scope of Christ’s work, then, I offer my own
account according to which we distinguish between fundamental
redemption, which belongs only to humankind, and derivative
redemption, which belongs to anything negatively affected by the
free moral decisions of human creatures.
With the general question of Christ’s redemptive scope sufficiently
dealt with, I turn in §2 to the particular question concerning the
possible discovery of ETIs (which are like us in the important
respects detailed above). Oliver Crisp, in his paper on multiple
incarnations12, presents the materials for a promising strategy for
addressing this concern. In summary, he claims that human nature
is, essentially, an immaterial substance which owns a corresponding
body. This opens up a path for Crisp to explain how ETIs might be
redeemed; namely, that such beings would also be essentially
immaterial and that, in assuming a human nature, Christ would have
assumed their nature as well. In other words, Crisp could solve the
particular question by claiming that ETIs would be human, and
consequently, fall under the umbrella of human redemption. Although
this solution is particularly elegant in many respects, I argue
that the combination of Crisp’s preferred model of atonement (i.e.
a form of penal substitution) and his substance dualist
anthropology is inconsistent with GP, that is, the same principle
that created trouble for Bonting. More broadly, I argue in this
section that if someone, such as Crisp, wishes to endorse a
substance dualist anthropology in which they identify what is
essentially human with an immaterial soul, then unless they also
advocate a mechanism of atonement that could not possibly be
satisfied by a wholly immaterial agent, their position conflicts
with GP. Thus, I argue that if one affirms GP, then they will find
no ultimate solution to the particular question of cosmic scope in
Crisp’s theology. Fortunately, not all is lost, for in §3, I
present an alternative anthropology, hylemorphic animalism, and
explain how it might allow us to endorse both GP and preserve some
of the charm of Crisp’s approach (including retaining his penal
substitutionary views on atonement if one so desires). Then, by
combining my solution to the general question of cosmic scope (from
§1) with my solution to the particular question of cosmic scope in
§3, we arrive at a complete solution to the cosmic scope problem of
Christian soteriology.
1. The General Question: Cosmic Scope and the Assumption of
Stardust
When considering whether Christ’s incarnation and atonement might
possess cosmic scope, a good place to begin is by asking whether
there is something, perhaps a property or some type of cosmic scope
problem. I agree; however, on the assumption that metaphysical
idealism is not a significant option for many theologians, I
present my hylemorphic animalist picture as a more traditional
alternative. That being said, there has been a sophisticated
resurgence of metaphysical idealism in some Christian circles in
recent years: (Adams 2007), (Farris and Hamilton 2016), and (Cowan
and Spiegel 2016). 11 See (Bonting 2003). 12 See (Crisp
2008).
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material part, that Christ shared with all things in virtue of
becoming incarnate.13 And perhaps we might think that in sharing
such a part, it might be reasonable to think that Christ’s
assumption of such a part would imply the extension of his
redemptive work to all things as well. This strategy is pursued by
biochemist and theologian Sjoerd Bonting, who writes,
Everywhere in the universe the same chemical elements are present
as on Earth […and] as far as we know, the earthly physical and
chemical laws are valid throughout the universe. We can therefore
make some predictions about extraterrestrial life. Such life will
be based, like all earthly life, on carbon chemistry, since carbon
is the only element able to form the long-chain compounds…essential
for the complex processes of growth and replication of living
cells.14
Later in this article and in light of the biochemistry that would
inevitably be shared between Jesus’ human nature and the rest of
creation, Bonting suggests,
In this way, we humans have part in, are united with, the entire
cosmos [because we] are made of stardust [i.e. the same fundamental
types of material parts, such as carbon atoms]. Jesus, being fully
human, also shares in this cosmic union, and thus through the
incarnation he becomes the cosmic Christ.15
In this passage, we find an argument for why Christ’s sharing
material parts (henceforth, ‘stardust’) with all of creation has
redemptive implications for the entire cosmos. Here is one way of
representing that argument16:
Saving Stardust Argument
1. In assuming a human nature, Christ assumed stardust. 2.
Something is redeemed if it is assumed in the incarnation.
Therefore,
3. Stardust is redeemed (from 1 & 2). 4. Creation is made out
of stardust (and nothing else).
Therefore,
5. All of creation is redeemed (from 3 & 4).
As a non-biochemist, I am happy to allow that premise (1) is true
without any reservations, and (3) and (5) seem unobjectionable
insofar as they merely follow from the premises preceding 13 In
this paper, I do not consider the arguments of Niels Henrik
Gregersen’s notion of deep Incarnation. That work is motivated by
the idea that the Son became flesh, as opposed to human, with
respect to the explicit affirmations of the New Testament.
Nevertheless, as Christology developed, especially through the
Cappodocians, the importance of the Son’s assuming a human nature
is central. This paper is in keeping with that strand of the
Christian tradition, although Gregersen’s work is admittedly worthy
of engagement in another context. See (Gregersen 2010). 14 (Bonting
2003, 593). 15 (Bonting 2003, 599). 16 I say ‘one way of
representing that argument’ because the reasoning is not made
sufficiently explicit in (Bonting 2003). Without the above theses
as represented by premises (2) and (4), however, it is unclear how
to get to the conclusion that Christ’s assumption of stardust
entails that his redemptive work has cosmic scope.
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them.17 Thus, if we are to assess the merits of this argument, our
focus must turn to premises (2) and (4). Let us take them in
reverse order.
Premise (4) might strike us as odd, initially, especially if we are
inclined to think that humans and other organisms are more than the
sum of their parts. However, premise (4) is not incompatible with
the claim that organisms are more than the sum of their parts, but
rather, it is incompatible with them being composed of anything
other than stardust.18
What more might there be to organisms than non-stardust components?
One promising solution would be to claim that the more involved in
organisms (and perhaps artifacts as well) is a particular
arrangement of stardust.19 On this sort of view, mental properties
and the like would supervene on (i.e. be determined by) different
arrangements of stardust, but no non-stardust mereological parts
would be needed to account for the new properties possessed by the
organisms in question. Thus, premise (4) seems in the clear, at
least, insofar as it is compatible with affirming that humans exist
and are greater than the sum of their parts (i.e. something which
the theological tradition would surely wish to affirm).
But what of premise (2)? Premise (2) bears a striking resemblance
to a well-known principle of Christology, which I noted in the
introduction, known as Gregory’s Principle (GP). GP derives from
historical debates concerning the Apollinarian heresy, and is used
explicitly by Gregory of Nazianzus in his Epistle 101, where he
writes,
If anyone has put his trust in Him as a Man without a human mind,
he is really bereft of mind, and quite unworthy of salvation. For
that which He has not assumed He has not healed; but that which is
united to His Godhead is also saved.20
The first half of the principle, italicized in the quotation from
Gregory, states a necessary condition on redemption. Put in
contrapositive form, it states that something is redeemed only if
it is assumed. This portion of the principle, however, is not what
we find in the Saving Stardust Argument. Rather, that argument
requires a sufficient condition (i.e. something is redeemed if
assumed), presumably articulated by the second half of Gregory’s
statement where he claims, “that which is united to His Godhead is
also saved.”
Is the second half of Gregory’s statement enough to establish the
sufficient condition needed for premise (2)? It seems not, for
Gregory’s statement is riddled with ambiguity. To see this, notice
first that not everything that was assumed by Christ required the
sort of redemption called for in the case of human nature. For
instance, someone might ask whether the properties being born in
Bethlehem 17 Despite accepting premises (3) and (5) for the sake of
the argument, it is perhaps worth noting the prima facie
bizarreness of claiming that “stardust is redeemed”. 18 See (Van
Inwagen 1990). 19 And this is a good thing since he explicitly
affirms the existence of the mental. Indeed, my best guess, given
what he says in (Bonting 2003, 593-594) is that he would either
affirm some sort of emergence theory concerning souls or property
dualism of some form. 20 Found in (Gregory of Nazianzus, “To
Cledonius the Priest Against Apollinarius”, 6th full paragraphs) at
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3103a.htm.
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or having two human hands (along with the arrangements of stardust
simples on which they supervene) needed to be redeemed in the same
sense as human nature generally.21 If the sufficient condition
applied to any type of thing united to the Godhead, then the
properties being born in Bethlehem and having two human hands were
redeemed because assumption guarantee their redemption.
Fortunately, more charitable interpretations of Gregory are
available. For instance, we might restrict the domain to which
Gregory refers by excluding from it anything which is not in need
of the sort of redemption awaiting human nature, such as the
properties suggested in the previous paragraph. In that case, a
more explicit statement from Gregory would read, “that which is in
need of redemption in the way human nature requires it and is
united to His Godhead is also saved.” On this version of the
sufficient condition, we do not run the risk of saying that certain
things are redeemed (in the way human nature is) that do not need
redemption. So, if we make the requisite changes to the argument,
the following results (we focus on just premises 1-3 for
convenience):
1. In assuming a human nature, Christ assumed stardust. 2*.
Something which is in need of redemption in the way human nature is
gets redeemed in the same sense if it is assumed in the
incarnation.
Therefore,
3. Stardust is redeemed (from 1 & 2).
The problem with making this change to premise (2*), however, is
that in order to maintain the argument’s validity, another premise
is needed between premises (1) and (3). Call this bridging premise
(2.5) that stardust is something in need of redemption in the way
human nature requires redemption. Affirming this additional premise
seems odd, to say the least, even if we allow for the specialized
materialist interpretation of premise (4) to inform what we say
about human nature. For on that specialized materialist
understanding, humans are not merely stardust, but they are
arrangements of stardust with some particularly impressive
properties (along with the arrangements of simples on which those
properties supervene). Thus, human nature, on this view, is
redeemed when the Godhead assumes stardust arranged
human-nature-wise. In other words, on such an account there is no
reason to think that stardust simpliciter is in need of the kind of
redemption motivating the Incarnation. Rather, it would be
particular arrangements of stardust that are in need of
redemption.
Thus, even with the requisite changes to the argument to
accommodate the insights of Gregory and the materialist
understanding of what humans are, we are left with a premise—i.e.
(2.5)— that is theologically suspect and probably false. This alone
gives us no reason to reject the conclusion that all of creation is
redeemed, of course, for there might be other conditions on which
the redemption of all creation is brought about; that is,
conditions which honor the cosmic scope of Christ’s atoning work as
articulated in various biblical passages. Let us then turn to some
of those 21 It doesn’t follow from something’s being a part of a
thing that it shares all properties with the whole. For instance, a
whole apple is apple-shaped, but no apple stem is apple-shaped.
Thus, even if human nature is in need of redemption, it does not
follow that hands, which are parts of individual human substances,
also share the property of needing redemption.
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passages and develop a model of the scope of redemption with which
we might affirm that all creation is redeemed.
Recall the passage with which this article opened, in which we saw
Paul claim that,
19 For in [Christ] all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20
and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on
earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.22
The thrust of this passage was that Christ would bring about
redemption for all of creation. Indeed, there are other passages
that speak of a distinctive need for creation to be redeemed, such
as Romans 8:19-22, which reads,
19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of
the sons of God. 20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not
willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope 21that the
creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and
obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we
know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the
pains of childbirth until now.
Though these passages admit of various interpretations, the idea
that all creation (i.e. the cosmos or, to use the biblical phrase,
everything in heaven and earth) has undergone corruption seems
clear enough.23 But little is said about the mechanism by which the
corruption of creation has been or will be addressed. Admittedly,
Colossians 1 claims that Christ’s atoning work at least plays an
important role in the redemption of all things, but how that is
worked out in detail regarding humanity is left open.
There is a hint in another Pauline passage, however, that might
suggest a coherent model by which we can address this issue:
17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old
has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18 All this is from God,
who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the
ministry of reconciliation;24
In this passage, we learn that Christ has inaugurated the new
creation, and as a result of that inauguration, the church at
Corinth, to whom Paul addresses this work, has received the
ministry of reconciliation.25 Thus, the redemptive work of Christ
is something in which his followers might take part. Indeed, in
many cases, they might be the proximate causes of the
reconciliation, though perhaps 22 Colossians 1:19-20. 23 Someone
might wonder what I mean by ‘corruption’ here, for creation is
clearly not corrupt in the same sense as fallen humanity. If this
was your thought, you would be correct. To say that there is
corruption present, I mean, roughly, that the corrupted thing is
not the way it should be. To distinguish between the corruption of
humanity and non-human creation, we can add that there is a
particular type of corruption that is applicable to humanity but
not non-human creation. That corruption is the state of being
morally culpable for breaking some sort of moral norm or divine
command. Nevertheless, the non-human part of creation remains
corrupt insofar as it lacks the order that would fully promote the
flourishing of its constituents. Thus, the sort of redemption
non-human creation needs is something like a reordering towards
flourishing. 24 2 Corinthians 5:17-18. 25 Though I do not mean to
imply that it is only the Corinthian church for whom this is true.
Obviously, it is the community of believers (or ‘faith-ers’ if you
prefer a less cognitively committal noun) that has received this
ministry.
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we might add that their contributions to redemption are only
effective because they were first redeemed by Christ’s Incarnation
and Atonement. In other words, I believe on the basis of these
passages, and other similar ones, we can distinguish between the
fundamental redemption of humankind and a derivative redemption of
the cosmos with the following sort of just-so story (i.e. a story
that is true, for all we know26):
In the beginning, God made the cosmos. God also made humanity as
representatives on earth of his governance of both the earth and
the cosmos of which it was a part. Tragically, humanity failed to
carry out its mission of reflecting God’s good governance to the
rest of creation, and as a result of the subsequent poor decisions
of humanity, creation was subjected to continual and increasing
corruption. In addition, humanity itself suffered. In particular,
its very nature was corrupted by original sin, that is, a special
sort of corruption that could be healed for all humanity only (i)
by the right sort of sacrificial act (ii) done by someone for whom
no original sin was present (iii) on the condition that the
sacrifice had to be accepted by those humans desiring its
redemptive benefits. Years later in the fulness of time God deigned
to take on the flesh of humanity, and in doing so, the human
body-soul composite which God assumed, something which in virtue of
being human possessed original sin, was cleansed of its original
sin by the divine nature with which it was hypostatically united.
Then, as a representative of humanity not in possession of original
sin, the incarnate God offered the requisite sacrificial act which
cleansed any of humanity who accepted it of their original sin in a
fundamental way.27 This was an inauguration of the new creation,
but not all was right, for the corruption of creation brought about
previously by humanity, a corruption known as fallenness, persisted
to varying degrees. Thus, the newly redeemed humanity was given the
mission to take up again right governance of creation, as God’s
representatives, to correct the damage done. Consequently, given
sufficient time for healing, all of creation would be redeemed
derivatively via the reconciling ministry of redeemed
humanity.
I do not claim that the above just-so story is true. I only claim
that it is true for all we know. Nevertheless, it does fit the
biblical narrative quite well in various places and incorporates
some insights of contemporary scholarship reflecting on the image
of God, nature of original sin, and the Fall itself.28 Thus, I
offer it in place of the mechanism suggested by Bonting as a way to
understand how the entire cosmos might receive the benefits of the
work of Christ. Although it goes a long way towards explaining the
cosmic scope of Christ’s redemptive work, it is incomplete as it
stands, for the particular question of possible fallen
extra-terrestrial beings remains to be addressed. It is to this
question we now turn.
26 The phrase “for all we know” signals the invocation of epistemic
possibility here. I should emphasize again that my including this
just-so story is neither a commitment to understanding the Genesis
narrative literally nor a commitment to a historical Adam and Eve.
27 I do not take the ‘acceptance’ clause to require reflective
(cognitive) assent. So long as the human involved is disposed to
accept the sacrifice in the right sort of way (whatever that is),
then they accrue the benefits of the redemptive work. Additional
work to deal with masked of finked dispositions might be necessary,
but I leave it for the reader to work out the minutia. 28 See, for
example, (Middleton 2005) and (Middleton 2014).
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2.1 A Cartesian Anthropology for ETIs
In the previous section we saw one way in which the benefits of
Christ’s redemptive work might be extended to any parts of creation
that had suffered corruption at the hands of sinful humanity but
were not themselves possessed of original sin. This solution leaves
unaddressed the question of whether Christ’s redemptive benefits
would also apply to non-human parts of the creation that were in
possession of a form of original sin of their own making. In his
article on the question of multiple incarnations, Oliver Crisp
writes concerning the potential for salvation of ETIs in possession
of something like original sin,
…there seem to be several possibilities with respect to the
question of the salvation of some putative extra-terrestrial
corporeal life forms. The first is that God does not save such
beings and the work of Christ does not apply to them. The second
[i.e. Crisp’s preferred answer] is that no additional incarnation
is required because the scope of Christ’s work includes them as
things stand. So God does save these beings, but through the work
of Christ. The third option is that the work of Christ might apply
to them (it is cosmic in its scope) but God has not deigned to save
any of these creatures. And the fourth option is that the work of
Christ does not apply to them, yet God has deigned to provide some
means of salvation for these creatures.29
It is in virtue of his commitment to the uniqueness of the
Incarnation, as suggested by various biblical passages, that Crisp
opts for the second solution. But notice that Crisp does not offer
any suggestions concerning how the work of Christ might apply to
ETIs. Indeed, this is surprising given that earlier in the article
he discusses how being human was of fundamental importance in
explaining the motivation behind the Incarnation.30 One might think
being whatever kind of thing is fallen, then, would be sufficient
to motivate an incarnation of a divine person as that kind of
thing.
Despite not explaining how Christ’s redemption might extend to
ETIs, Crisp’s essay and the reflections in the previous paragraph
provide fodder for such an explanation. For perhaps if we take into
account the nature of humanity and the nature of ETIs that are
similar to humanity in the relevant respects—e.g. cognitive
abilities and possession of original sin—then perhaps we can
conclude that the ETIs under question simply are human. And if so,
then ETIs would fall under the coverage of human redemption.
Consider the following:
1. Christ only assumed a human nature. 2. ETIs would be redeemed in
the same way humankind was redeemed. 3. Humankind was redeemed by
the assumption of a human nature.
Therefore,
29 (Crisp 2008, 237). 30 See, for instance, (Crisp 2008, 235): “If
no human being had fallen, there would be no motivation for the
incarnation, on this view.” For arguments that there would be an
incarnation even without a Fall, however, see (Van Driel
2008).
-10-
4. ETIs would be redeemed by the assumption of an ETI nature (from
2-3)
If all of the above premises are true and ETIs actually exist, then
it immediately follows that
5. The nature of an ETI is the same as the nature of a human.
To see this, simply assume for reductio that (5) is false and that
(1)-(4) are all true and ETIs exist. If ETIs have a different
nature, because of our suppositional rejection of (5), then it
would follow from not-(5) and the truth of (4) that Christ assumed
an ETI (i.e. non-human) nature. That is, the rejection of (5) would
entail that it is not the case that Christ only assumed a human
nature. But that claim is merely the negation of premise (1). And
so, assuming that (5) is false entails a contradiction, i.e.
something I suggest we avoid attributing to Crisp. Thus, if we wish
to suggest a way in which Crisp might retain his preferred solution
to the particular question about the possible existence of ETIs, we
should understand him as assenting to the truth of (5).
Assenting to (5)’s truth is insufficient, however, for explaining
how it could be true. To provide an adequate explanation, then, we
should attend to Crisp’s preferred understanding of what humans
are. In setting out his account of human ontology, Crisp
remarks,
…almost all orthodox classical theologians without exception held
to some form of substance dualism with respect to human persons…the
[Cartesian version of substance dualism is this]: a human is an
essentially immaterial substance (i.e. a mind or soul) that is
contingently related to a particular parcel of matter, which it
‘owns’ and by means of which it is able to act in the material
world (i.e. a body).31
…the majority of substance dualists hold to the [central]
thesis…[of] the Cartesian account…that human persons are identical
with souls and only contingently related to a certain physical
body, which is not part of that human person.32
As he makes clear in the remainder of his article, Crisp affirms
these two claims concerning what humans are—i.e. that they are
essentially immaterial substances which we might call souls.
Moreover, on this account of human persons, to be human does not
require that one have a human body. Indeed, one need not have any
body at all to be human. All that is necessary is that one be a
soul or immaterial substance that, somehow, counts as human.
In virtue of what might a particular immaterial substance count as
human as opposed to, for instance, an angel? One way to distinguish
them would be to claim that although strictly speaking humans can
exist as immaterial substances (and hence are only essentially
immaterial), nevertheless they are normatively embodied. For a
thing to be normatively embodied is for it to only function
properly when embodied, and this can be true, even if it is not
necessarily embodied.33 Thus, Crisp could maintain the distinction
in kind between angels and humans easily enough, even if both are
essentially immaterial, by claiming that humans are normatively
embodied (while angels are not).
31 (Crisp 2008, 228). 32 (Crisp 2008, 228fn24). 33 See (Thornton
MS, 3).
-11-
But even if Crisp can distinguish between the nature of humans and
the nature of angels in this way, one might wonder whether there
are other creatures that are essentially immaterial while
nevertheless also being normatively embodied. Any of the other
creatures on earth, for instance, might meet this description on
Crisp’s ontology, for all we know. So, clearly, we must say more on
Crisp’s behalf.
If there are other necessarily immaterial but normatively embodied
creatures, then perhaps Crisp can distinguish them from each other
by further appeals to the notion of a kind-essence.34 In other
words, he might simply claim that in the case of human beings, to
be human is to be an immaterial substance that instantiates the
kind-essence human, and whatever other necessarily immaterial but
normatively embodied creatures there are on earth instantiate a
different kind-essence (e.g. cows have bovinity and frogs have
anurity).
These reflections then, allow us to offer the following as a way
for Crisp to extend the benefits of Christ’s redemption to ETIs
were any discovered. Were any ETIs discovered, then on the
assumption that they were relatively similar to humankind, we would
have good reason, given the affirmations in the above argument, to
hold that they are essentially immaterial but normatively embodied
substances that instantiate the kind-essence humanity. In other
words, they would just be human.
Suppose someone were to object, “But surely not just any ETI would
be human. Even the most traditional ETIs in science fiction have
bodies of a very different sort than human bodies. So, we would be
crazy to think they are human!”
In reply, we might simply point out a couple of features of the
anthropology just sketched. First, being normatively embodied need
not entail being normatively embodied by any particular matter
(e.g. carbon). And if so, then the bodies of “little green men”
could count as human bodies, despite appearing quite different than
the human bodies with which we are typically acquainted. Secondly,
recall that having a body at all is contingent on this account of
human nature, and thus, it would be surprising that something’s
having one sort of body rather than another would constitute a
counterexample to the claim that that thing was human. The
counterexample would need to appeal to something about what it is
to be human—i.e. being an immaterial substance instantiating the
kind- essence human—rather than something contingent.35
2.2 A Worry for Crisp
Despite this rather elegant means of addressing the particular
question of how Christ’s benefits might extend to sinful ETIs were
we to learn of their existence, there remains at least one concern
for Crisp’s account; namely, that a combination of this response to
the particular question, his preferred 34 See (Loux 2006) for a
discussion of kind-essences, also referred to as ‘substance kinds’.
35 To put the point another way: one does not sufficiently
demonstrate that some x is not human by appealing to a contingent
feature of x that is not shared by any human (other than x, if x is
in fact human). Suppose, for instance, that I am the only human
alive with naturally occurring green hair, and someone says, “Look!
No human I’ve ever met has green hair. Therefore, you are not
human!” We should not be impressed with such reasoning.
-12-
penal substitution model of atonement, and the motivations which
underlie Gregory’s Principle commits him to a theologically
troubling claim; namely, that humanity could have been redeemed by
means of an immaterial incarnation.
In what follows, then, I present an argument focused narrowly on
Crisp’s theological resources. This narrow focus, however, does not
preclude my argument from having relevance to anyone other than
Crisp, and the reason for this is three-fold. First, anyone who
endorses both substance dualism and penal substitution, like
Crisp36, is likewise committed to the theologically troubling
conclusion I highlight. Second, even if someone were to deny either
or both substance dualism and penal substitution, I am not aware of
anyone who has drawn attention to another case purporting to
demonstrate that penal substitution and substance dualism give rise
to a similar theological or philosophical conflict. Thus, if my
argument is sound, it introduces a further wrinkle into affirming
either substance dualism37 or penal substitution38; namely, that
affirming one provides a significant reason to not affirm the
other. Third, perhaps you, the reader, might be inclined to raise
an eyebrow at the mention of penal substitution, for it is a fairly
specific model of atonement. Many readers, in fact, might be
inclined to simply reject penal substitution but hold onto their
substance dualist commitments in order to avoid the argument that
follows. While such a move would, of course, be possible were
someone wishing to evade commitment to the conclusion of the
particular argument below, it is not sufficient to avoid the more
general concern, and here is why.
Penal substitution is just one model of atonement among others that
identifies a mechanism of atonement which might be offered by an
immaterial substance instantiating the kind-essence human. I use it
in the argument below given the focus on the theology of Crisp, but
the words ‘penal substitution’ could just as easily be read as a
variable into which someone might substitute their own model of
atonement. After having made such a substitution, they can then ask
whether the resulting premise is true (i.e. the premise that claims
of a model of atonement that its mechanism of atonement could be
offered by an immaterial substance). If that premise is indeed
true, then the argument I present against Crisp is one with which
they need to reckon as well, for it is the possibility of an
immaterial substance making atonement (alongside substance dualism)
that fundamentally creates the issue. Thus, rejecting penal
substitution will not get someone out of the argument. They need to
reject any model of atonement that permits an immaterial
incarnation to offer atonement.
So, without further ado, here is the argument against Crisp’s
proposed solution to the particular question of extending the
benefits of Christ’s redemption to ETIs (call it the Crisp
Argument):
36 See, for instance, (Crisp 2016). (Moreland and Craig 2017) is
another good example of a popular text explicitly defending both
substance dualism and penal substitution. 37 For an excellent
overview of the state of the art in substance dualism, see the
collection of essays in (Loose, Menuge, and Moreland 2018). The
recent work for who is probably the best-known defender of
contemporary Cartesian dualism (i.e. the variety endorsed by Crisp
here), see (Swinburne 2013). 38 The following is a representative
sample of scholars defending penal substitution: (Craig 2018),
(Gathercole 2015), (Hill and James III 2004), (Hill and Jedwab
2015), Jeffery, Ovey, Sach 2007), (Strabbing 2016), and (Vidu
2014).
-13-
1. If Crisp’s substance dualism is true, then to be human is to be
an immaterial substance that instantiates the kind-essence
human.
2. If to be human is to be an immaterial substance that
instantiates the kind-essence human, then God could have assumed a
human nature by assuming merely a human soul.
3. Human nature is all that is in need of fundamental redemption.
4. If penal substitution is true, then atonement could have been
made by an
immaterial incarnation. 5. If God could have assumed a human nature
by assuming merely a human soul,
human nature is all that is in need of fundamental redemption, and
atonement could have been made by an immaterial incarnation, then
some of humanity could have been redeemed by means of an immaterial
incarnation.
Therefore,
6. If Crisp’s substance dualism is true and penal substitution is
true, then some of humanity could have been redeemed by means of an
immaterial incarnation.39
Premise (1) is simply a statement of Crisp’s substance dualism.
Premise (2) might appear slightly more objectionable, but in
essence it is merely making the claim that assuming a human soul
would be sufficient for God to assume a human nature. This claim,
too, seems to simply follow from Crisp’s dualism. Thus, to respond
to the argument, Crisp would need to deny either premises (3), (4),
or (5). Let us consider the promise of rejecting these
premises.
To reject premise (3) is to claim that there is something other
than human nature that is in need of the sort of redemption which
motivates the incarnation (i.e. the sort of redemption glossed in
the phrase ‘fundamental redemption’). Whatever thing other than
human nature might be in need of fundamental redemption, however,
must be some contingent feature of humanity. But recall our
discussion of contingent features such as having two hands or being
born in Bethlehem from §2. There we saw that there was good reason
to think that the motivation for Gregory’s Principle excluded such
contingent features of Christ’s particular instantiation of a human
nature. Thus, rejecting premise (3) seems problematic because it is
in conflict with GP.
What about rejecting premise (4)? To reject (4) one would need to
deny that an immaterial substance instantiating the kind-essence
human could suffer and perhaps also that in virtue of that
suffering they could endure punishment sufficient for making
atonement for the sins of humanity. However, denying that
non-embodied immaterial substances (human or not) can suffer would
run into theological difficulties for any realists about fallen
angels and such things. In addition, there are undoubtedly many
varieties of mental suffering that one can endure, and there does
not seem to be 39 Allow me to emphasize that this conclusion will
not be a problem for someone who affirms Berkeleyan idealism. After
all, they would accept the conclusion because it would be a
conditional with a false antecedent. But it is the commitment to
two types of substances, one of which is immaterial and the other
material, that I take to be in tension with the consequence of (6).
So, this argument is not intended to cause any sort of worry for
idealists of this sort.
-14-
any reason to deny that such suffering could apply in principle to
non-embodied immaterial substances. But lastly, and importantly, it
seems that in the case of the incarnation on a penal substitution
model, it is the suffering of the particular person of Jesus, one
possessed of both a human and divine nature, that ultimately
results in a sufficient payment for the sins of humanity. Thus, on
a model such as this that claims that Christ endured an amount of
suffering that would have been punishment were it applied to us,
there does not seem to be any in principle reason to deny that an
immaterial incarnation could provide the necessary offering for
atonement.
Does anything change when we consider premise (5)? Rejecting (5)
amounts to denying that it is possible that humanity might be
redeemed by means of an immaterial incarnation while simultaneously
affirming both that God could have undergone a merely immaterial
incarnation, offered atonement as an immaterial agent, and that
nothing other than human nature was in need of fundamental
redemption by assumption.40 Given that incarnation and atonement
just are the necessary divine contributions to the redemption of
humanity, however, it seems reasonable to think that in at least
some possible world where an immaterial incarnation and atonement
have been made, at least one human person accepted Christ’s payment
for redemption. Perhaps, of course, there are also possible worlds
where all human agents reject the atonement made by an immaterial
Christ, but the existence of such worlds would not preclude the
existence of at least one other possible world where some
individual human was redeemed. So, I see no compelling reason for
denying (5).
Perhaps the above reflections of the Crisp Argument are mistaken,
but if they are not, there is a final response open to Crisp;
namely, he might simply accept the conclusion of the argument. That
is, Crisp could just admit that as he understands soteriology,
humanity could have been redeemed by means of an entirely
immaterial incarnation. This is not unorthodox, as far as I am
aware, for he would not thereby be committed to denying that the
Second Person of the Trinity actually assumed a human body. Nor
would he be denying that it was most fitting for the Second Person
to assume a human body. Nor would he be affirming the possibility
that redemption could be achieved without the assumption of the
whole of a human nature, for the assumption of a human soul would
just be the assumption of the whole of a human nature.41
Nevertheless, there is something unsettling about this claim, for
the general thrust of the Fall narrative, especially as found in
Paul, seems to include the idea that sinful flesh is in need of
redemption.42 Indeed, this might lead one to wonder whether
embodiment really is a contingent matter for human beings after
all. In light of this tension, and for those who find it more
appealing to adopt an alternative anthropology to Crisp than an
alternative model of atonement, let us consider a different
anthropology not faced with such theologically uncomfortable
implications.
40 Interestingly, then, it is not coherent to deny both (4) and (5)
because denying them both commits one to both affirming and denying
the possibility of an immaterial substance making atonement. 41 I
add this point lest someone think Crisp would here be throwing in
his lot with Gnostics or those Marcionites with whom Tertullian
quarreled in his “On the Flesh of Christ”. 42 As a referee points
out, sinful flesh is condemned in Romans 8:3 (κατκρινεν τν μαρταν ν
τ σαρκ), which could make someone skeptical of the idea that flesh
is redeemed. In this paper, there is not space to defend this
interpretive move, especially concerning one of the most heavily
contested passages in scriptural scholarship. Nevertheless, see
(Gregersen 2010) for a biblical defense of what I have assumed in
the statement to which this footnote is appended.
-15-
3. Hylemorphic Animalism and the Scope of Redemption
The worries for Crisp’s account in the previous section spawned
primarily from his claim concerning what human beings are. Crisp,
as I understand him, claims that humans are immaterial substances
possessed of the kind-essence humanity. In this section, I offer an
alternative anthropology, hylemorphic animalism43, which avoids the
strange theological implications accompanying Crisp’s dualism while
retaining his elegant response to the particular question
concerning the salvation of ETIs. Let us begin with an explanation
of animalism first, followed immediately by an explanation of the
hylemorphic variety of it.
Animalism is the claim that we are animals, where the referent of
‘we’ is the set of human persons. So, animalism is the claim that
human persons are animals. If you find yourself wondering why you
should believe such a thing (and it is a controversial thesis),
consider the following argument which proceeds on the supposition
that you are sitting in a chair.
Thinking Animal Argument
1. In your chair sits a human animal. 2. The human animal sitting
in your chair is thinking. 3. But you are the only thinking being
sitting in your chair.
Therefore,
4. You are the human animal.44
If someone affirms the first three premises of this argument, they
must accept the conclusion. Thus, the only way out of the argument
is to deny one of the first three premises.
Perhaps you deny that there are any animals; that is, perhaps you
are an animal nihilist. In that case, you have a reason to deny
premises (1) and (2) since they presuppose the existence of
animals. Alternatively, you might deny the existence of thinking
things, in which case, you have reason to deny premises (2) and
(3). Still yet, you might claim that human persons are constituted
by human animals without being reducible to a human animal. In that
case, you might claim that while human persons think, the human
animals which constitute human persons do not. If this describes
you, then you have a reason to deny premise (2). Or you might even
claim that both you (i.e. the human person) and the human animal
are thinking, in which case you have a reason to deny (3). None of
these options strike me as particularly plausible; but seeing as it
is not the purpose of this paper to argue for the truth of
animalism, I refrain from arguing against these (or any other)
reasons for rejecting the Thinking Animal Argument. Let it suffice
for me to simply stipulate that animalism is committed to accepting
the soundness of the Thinking Animal Argument.
43 See (Toner 2011) and (Thornton 2016) for an explanation of
hylemorphic animalism. See (Olson 1997) for a discussion of a
particularly interesting non-hylemorphic variety of animalism. 44
See (Blatti 2016) and (Olson 2007) for variations on this
argument.
-16-
So, the animalist claims that human persons are animals. Yet this
leaves unanswered the question, what are animals? It is in
answering this question that the distinctives of hylemorphic
animalism reveal themselves.
According to hylemorphists, animals are hylemorphic compounds. That
is, animals are body- soul composites that cease to exist upon
losing either of those fundamental parts (i.e. either their body or
the soul which animates it).45 Thus, the hylemorphic animalist is
committed to denying the possibility of an animal’s persisting
beyond either its biological death (i.e. as an immaterial human
soul) or the loss of its soul (i.e. as a dead animal). Both events
are sufficient for the animal to go out of existence.46
What exactly is the soul? The soul is that part of the animal which
animates it, but importantly (and unlike the understanding of soul
accompanying substance dualism), the soul is not a substance.
Neither is the soul an animal. For animals, on this account, must
have the capacity for sensation, and immaterial souls hardly seem
capable of sensation given their lack of sense organs.47 Thus, only
biological organisms will count as animals on this hylemorphic
view.
Yet still, what is it that differentiates one animal from another?
Why is it, for instance, that frogs and cows are not humans if they
too are composed of a body and soul? The answer to be given here is
similar to the answer provided in our examination of Crisp’s
anthropology; namely, that the difference between humans, cows, and
frogs is a difference in kind-essence. In other words, humans are
body-soul composites that exemplify the kind-essence human, cows
are body-soul composites that exemplify the kind-essence bovinity,
and frogs are body-soul composites that exemplify the kind- essence
anurity. And each of these kind-essences can be delineated from one
another on the basis of the sorts of natural capacities the
instantiation of that kind-essence guarantees. Both frogs and cows
must have a degree of mobility and nutritive functionality while
humans must in addition have rationality. Thus, on this account
intelligence is the distinguishing feature of humanity.
These reflections might lead us to wonder whether frogs and cows
are actually different kinds of creatures, metaphysically-speaking.
Of course, it is undeniable that frogs and cows belong to different
biological kinds. Calling this biological claim into question would
be laughable. But as in many areas of philosophy, moving from
biological description to metaphysical taxonomies is dubious at
best48; and thus, it is worth allowing that when it comes to the
metaphysics, frogs and cows might be different biological
manifestations of the same kind of being in virtue of instantiating
the same kind- essence (i.e. something which would happen if
anurity and bovinity were identical).
45 I hereby note my respectful disagreement with (Thornton MS) who
claims that animals can sometimes be immaterial. Thornton’s version
of animalism, by such lights, would be susceptible to the same
theological implications facing Crisp’s form of dualism, which is
part of the reason I wish to resist it. 46 See (Toner 2014) for a
discussion to motivate the acceptance of this line. 47 On
traditional accounts, a soul by itself could compose (or be) an
angel. But angels are not animals since they lack sensations, and
they would instantiate the kind essence angel. 48 See (Oderberg
2007, chapter 9) for an interesting discussion of the adequacy of
biological categories as determining natural kinds.
-17-
Whether or not two biologically distinct species might be
metaphysically of the same kind has obvious relevance to the
particular question at hand, for we might ask whether ETIs and
humans would instantiate the same kind-essence despite emerging
from two (or more) divergent biological histories. On the
hylemorphic animalist’s account, I suggest that the answer to such
a question would be an affirmative (i.e. they indeed might share
the same kind-essence). Here’s why.
When it comes to differentiating between kind-essences, we tend to
appeal to differences in natural capacities the possession of which
are entailed by the instantiation of a particular kind-essence. In
general, then, when carving up metaphysical space, we might
differentiate capacities in a coarse- grained (e.g. dividing it
into nutritive, motive, and rational capacities) or fine-grained
(e.g. capacities for digestion, sight, echo-location, different
sorts of temporal-reasoning, self-awareness, etc.) fashion. Let us
consider the implications for the particular question of the
salvation of ETIs on both ways of dividing up metaphysical
categories.
On the coarse-grained approach, the possession of nutritive,
sensitive, and ratiocinative natural capacities would suffice for
something to be human. Thus, if the coarse-grained approach were
correct, then ETIs would be human in the metaphysical sense, and
thus, the benefits of Christ’s redemptive work would extend to them
in a straightforward manner as follows.49 Christ fundamentally
redeemed all humanity. All ETIs are human. Therefore, ETIs are
redeemed.
Suppose, however, that we adopt the fine-grained approach. In that
case, the question of metaphysics becomes much more complicated,
for suppose we discover ETIs that move by, for example,
echolocation. They would not be human only if the kind-essence
humanity does not give humans a natural capacity to echolocate.
But, there are documented cases of human beings who routinely and
successfully echolocate.50 Such cases provide evidence that humans
do have a capacity to echolocate given that certain environmental
parameters are in place, and thus, without knowing more about how
different natural capacities relate to one another, it would be
impossible to determine whether or not these aliens fell under the
kind-essence human. From this it would follow that, for all we
know, the ETIs in question might indeed be human.
Thus, hylemorphic animalism at least implies that no matter what
ETIs we might discover in the future, it will remain epistemically
possible that they possess the kind-essence human. Indeed, this
would follow from either the coarse-grained or fine-grained
approach to differentiating kind-essences. But on the
coarse-grained approach, we could say something stronger. Were it
an accurate description of the metaphysical realm, then not only
would it be epistemically possible that ETIs are human but it would
also follow that they are actually human.
49 Interestingly, it is likely that at the metaphysical level,
Christ’s redemptive benefits on this account might very well extend
to other Earthly animals, such as chimpanzees or dolphins, as well.
If so, then the set of lifeforms in need of human-like redemption
will simply be more heavily populated than we originally thought.
This opens up a number of interesting questions that would take us
too far from our current topic of interest (e.g. whether
chimpanzees have original sin in virtue of the Adamic narrative).
50 See, for instance, this video by HD World Report describing the
developments of Daniel Tish:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_E3zxx2l9g.
-18-
Allow me, then, to conclude with some brief reflections on the
implications of this result for an explanation of how the benefits
of Christ’s redemptive activity might apply to ETIs in the same way
as it does to biological humans. If hylemorphic animalism is true,
then it entails at least the epistemic possibility that the
salvation of ETIs is covered by the same incarnational event that
brings about human redemption. Thus, if a Christian were committed
to the uniqueness of the incarnation, then they could maintain that
conviction coherently and offer the above hylemorphic animalist
account of what human persons are as an explanation for how the
discovery of ETIs would not lead them to expect an additional
incarnation to take place. Moreover, on this account, humans are
not essentially immaterial substances, as on Crisp’s substance
dualism, and thus, Gregory’s Principle does not imply any
theologically untoward theoretical commitments either. Thus, it
seems that hylemorphic animalism can at least temper the
soteriological concerns raised by the possibility of intelligent
extra- terrestrial life.
4. Conclusion
In this paper, I have argued that the best approach to explaining
how Christ’s redemptive work might have cosmic scope is
two-pronged. According to the first prong, we must recognize that
there is a fundamental redemption applied to humankind in virtue of
the Incarnation and atonement which covers human sin and a
derivative redemption applied to the rest of creation in virtue of
human participation in the new creation, a participation which
involves resuming its proper governance of creation. According to
the second prong, we must further recognize that there is a real
possibility that extra-terrestrial life in need of the sort of
redemption received by humanity might exist. In that case, we can
explain how Christ’s redemption would apply to such ETIs in virtue
of their being human. I argued further, however, that substance
dualist variants of this second prong committed to a penal
substitution model of atonement faced a theologically troubling
implication that Christ could have redeemed humanity by merely
assuming an immaterial soul. In place of this substance dualist
understanding of the human person, then, I offered a hylemorphic
animalist account that retained the benefits of the substance
dualist view without its theological costs.51
51 I would like to single out Joshua Cockayne in thanks for crucial
feedback in the substance and organization of this paper. In
addition, I would like to thank several people for conversations,
encouragement, and feedback that was of significant help as I wrote
and revised this article: Christa McKirland, James T. Turner, Tim
Mulgan (who organized a workshop on extra-terrestrials and cosmic
purpose for which the ideas of this article were first conceived),
Andrew Torrance, Oliver D. Crisp, Patrick Toner, Ryan Mullins, Ryan
Bollier, and three anonymous referees. And finally, I would like to
thank the Templeton Religion Trust whose generous funding created
an environment in which I had sufficient time to dedicate to this
(let’s be honest) very speculative project.
-19-
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